


go softly

by Cicadaemon



Category: The Terror (TV 2018), The Terror - Dan Simmons
Genre: Domestic Fluff, F/M, Post-Canon
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2018-08-20
Updated: 2018-08-20
Packaged: 2019-06-29 22:51:07
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 2
Words: 1,709
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/15738924
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Cicadaemon/pseuds/Cicadaemon
Summary: Here she was though, thousands of miles away from home with a baby nestled into her chest.





	1. Chapter 1

Silna could easily admit that she had never wanted children. It was not something that had ever been on her mind. Her own father hadn’t been her father. He had raised her yes, but he hadn’t given her life. Though it would do the man discredit to say he hadn’t been a father to her and she had loved him. It was just the knowledge of knowing that separation of family was so easy had turned her away from the idea originally. Then she learned any child of hers would most likely follow in her footsteps. She had been unwilling and afraid. She owed it to her people and her father to be the shaman that would tame the Tuunbaq. What she owed didn’t mean she wanted it for herself or any child she had.

So, she swore off of it.

Here she was though, thousands of miles away from home with a baby nestled into her chest. She hadn’t known in the beginning. She had complained to her husband about soreness and sickness, but it wasn’t until she felt a little flutter in her stomach did she realize. It brought her shame now that her first reaction to realizing she was pregnant was horror. That passed quickly thankfully.

This seemed pointless now. She hadn’t felt much affection throughout the pregnancy though she could not keep her heart from swelling feeling her child move or the wonder that would appear on Harry’s face when he feel it. In fact that was a lie entirely, she had plenty affection she just did not know how to show or handle it. In front of Jane or Joseph she would never betray what she felt, but in privacy she would press Harry's hand to her growing stomach and smile with him. It had all been so conflicting and confusing, but something wonderful.

A part of her had looked forward to this, and this she could blame entirely on Harry. When they had arrived in his homeland, they had made it to the home his family owned in time to say goodbye to his youngest brother before he passed. It had been in those hard weeks that followed she saw and understood the appeal of family. To see them all interact with each other, both the joy of seeing a brother again and saying goodbye to another had made her jealous. There had been such love there she had never really got the chance to experience, and though the others had been wary of her in the beginning that love eventually reached her. Robert, before leaving for London had been the first to hug her and call her sister. Despite all this, she felt as though she was not one of them truly. She'd never be, to them she may forever remain the strange women Harry brought home and called his wife. This she accepted. It had been enough to wonder at the family she could perhaps make. 

In the coming weeks of their child, Silna and Harry had communicated on what name they’d choose. She had no opinion for English names, but when she had learned that a tradition here would mean naming their child after one of Harry’s family she had pushed for one name though no pushing was required. He had accepted an English name quickly and allowed her full rights to choose an Netsilik name. In the end though, she though she preferred the English name they had given their son.

He snuggled into her, whimpered softly but quickly fell asleep again. He was still so fresh and new, barely hours old and already he was quite a character. Harry was next to her, his arm around her and his head resting on her shoulder. She hadn’t eyes from him, but for tiny Archie who again whimpered.

“Perhaps a bad dream,” Her husband whispered. “Or hungry.”

She nodded. She undid her shift quickly and the baby took her quickly. She finally looked to Harry who had moved his head away. His face was still close enough that most of her view was taken up by very tired green eyes. She closed her own and pressed her face to his own, their noses touching before she breathed in deeply, something he copied. She felt his lips press to hers, the weird way these pale men showed their affection, but one she did not mind now.

Silna could easily admit she never expected to have children. She hadn’t expected to fall in love, or to travel farther than most of her people have, or to find the company of so many white people enjoyable. Yet here she was, thousands of miles away from the home she once knew, and she would not change a single thing.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> I have so many feelings about the sort of family Harry and Silna would have ok


	2. Chapter 2

“I’ve always wanted to meet an Eski,” the dying boy had said from his death bed. He sat up some as he said this. “I was so jealous when Harry went off. Robert was too, but he didn’t get stuck with a job that trapped him.”

Silna when she arrived in Anstruther (she knew how to spell it but never how to pronounce it) had been struck by the nature of Harry’s siblings. She had assumed that all the Goodsirs would be kind and gentle, but she had been met with cold looks and one very loud boy. Of course, it had been over a year now, and the cold looks were gone, and she saw that, yes, they were all so good-natured, but her first encounter of that was with the youngest.

It had been some time in the first night, when Harry had pretended to sleep and Silna couldn’t force herself to. She had snuck away to the third level of the house (she still had a hard time wrapping her head around these permanent structures) and found herself in the company of the one brother she hadn’t met earlier and Joseph, the shaman. Or priest. Or minister. She hadn’t known the difference between the words then.

“Gently,” Joseph was soft spoken much like John, the tall, wiry one with sad eyes. “You shouldn’t sit up too much-“

“As though it’ll do any difference,” the sick boy replied. “I’ll die even if I lie down.”

Silna had found this amusing. This boy was more a child then the rest of the brothers, even in his sickness he still looked so youthful. Perhaps it was his kind eyes, a darker green than Harry's that showed no signs of the coldness she encountered earlier. Joseph hadn’t the cold look, but one could tell he was wary. As though he didn’t know how to approach her. When he caught her staring he smiled. She looked back to the boy again.

“Archibald,” the boy held out his hand, strong looking even in his frail state. “But please call me Archie.”

He had talked most of the night, explaining who he was and asked her who she was, Joseph being kind enough to fetch paper, so she could spell out in sloppy letters her answers. He had through coughing told her that he was so happy to have met her.

He had died not too long afterwards, and the family had gone into mourning. Silna was not privy to dresses, but for the sake of the family she had borrowed old dark dresses from Jane and worn them with no complaints.

When she had pushed to name their son after his dead brother, Silna had explained to Harry that first night. How comforting it had been to be around someone else so much like him.

“He was always so good,” Harry had said softly. “Too good.”

It had been a while now since then, since the death and birth of the two Archies, and she was finally comfortable in the routine her son was putting her through. Her son which his aunt referred to affectionately as “Little Archie” was fussy with heat that was starting to descend. He seemed easy to cry, but easy to sooth. Jane had teased calling him a little glutton, but Silna didn’t mind. She was willing to give all the love and attention she could give, though she was not always sure of herself.

“His hair is getting curly,” Harry had noted one day, holding Archie all swaddled and sleeping. They were both lounging on the second-floor drawing room, not yet ready to sleep. “Eyes are getting darker too. Barely, but it’s there. I wouldn't be surprised if they go grey.”

She nodded, before leaning over Harry to sweep at the little hairs on Archie’s forehead. Their son blinked lazily at this and closed his eyes, his mouth popping open into a little ‘o’. They both smiled at this.

“I remember when Robert and Archie were babies,” Harry said suddenly. He switched to Inuktitut quickly, the words confident and the sentences well structured. “He is so much quieter than them.”

Silna laughed at this and the sound woke Archie up with a jolt. They froze, watching his lip quiver before he decided that this was not worth it and fell back asleep. Harry chuckled at this and Silna found herself laughing again too, much softer this time.

She put her hand on Harry’s bicep, gently squeezing. They didn’t have paper around, and she didn’t know how to say what she wanted with her hands alone. She didn’t like speaking anymore, the sound was so rough and guttural. She hadn’t cut her tongue out for fun, she was suppose to be a mute, but for Harry she could always make an exception.

“You miss him?” She had trouble with her m’s and s’s, but she was sure the word was clear enough Harry could get it.

He nodded, looking down to his son. “All the time. And my father. And my mam. There’s nothing I can do about it. Whatever energy I could put towards my grief for them will be put towards my love for this one.”

She nodded, understanding completely. She had her own grief, her own feelings which had never been resolved even after 3 years. Putting whatever she had aside for their little son and raising him with so much love seemed more then fair for all three of them.


End file.
